#34 PUPPY -- A PRINCE, A PUP, AND A PURPOSE
I watched with interest an interview of England’s Prince Harry, and his American wife, Duchess Meghan, conducted by Oprah, the Queen of Questions. It was mostly Meghan’s story. Done well enough, I would say. I loved that the couple, living now in California, has rescue dogs, as well as rescue chickens.
My attention, however, locked in on Prince Harry as he spoke of his wife’s amazing coolness, kindness, warmth, ease, and relatability made public on what, I think, was their first royal trip to some part of the Commonwealth. Australia? A bit of video was shown, and when the camera came back to Harry’s face, it showed a man remembering long hidden pain. When the interview noted similarities of unrelenting and brutal treatment by royals and reporters of both his late mother, Diana, and now his wife, Meghan—non-royal women effortlessly able to steal the love of an Empire’s people—then Harry’s reasons for leaving his role as a senior royal, came clear.
All of this leads to Scooter Sublime, who in this case, is a teacher of lessons. This past Sunday morning, Scooter discovered a gift left for him at our apartment door.
“Oh! Joy!” said he, tossing the gift, and watching it clumsily stagger to a settled stop. Two very small, heavily treaded truck tires locked as a sphere . . . and, “OH! a bell in the space inside!” Toss it! Run it down. Get it. Toss again! Listen to that bell ringing!
“Release,” say his people, who roll the toy down a long hallway. Scooter runs, retrieves, returns, releases. Again and again. This is busy time, not thinking time. This is the duty of his very breeding: energy, chase, retrieve, return home. Princes and pups have duties.
Having finished the fun and frantic runs, Scooter returned home. He grew quiet, holding the circle of tires between his paws, under his gaze. We, his people, watched. Scooter began to chew.
Notice, he made clear to us. If something cries out but is locked deep inside, it needs to be brought out. Hidden stuff doesn’t work. For the Prince it was deep truth. For the pup, it began with the squeaker inside his first Lamb Chop, back in his baby days.
“That hidden cry has got to be freed.” Hidden things came out of the second, third, fourth Lamb Chop. They got released from two stuffed Lamas, one platypus, a groundhog, an indestructible fire hose, a stuffed shark, and now, if his people allowed, he’d work on releasing a bell.
Scooter means for all deep, hidden cries to be freed. He lives peaceably, as perhaps we all should, with the torn residue of what remains from the work of liberation. For Scooter, that includes even the skin of balloons whose air has been released. He treats freed items, bells or squeakers, with great respect. It’s just that deep, hidden things need release.
